Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.

The Flood Control District has 133 rain gauges in Harris County, which really isn't very many when you consider the size of the area.

District Spokesperson Heather Saucier says some of the gauges are as much as five miles apart and that's why they need volunteers to set up and monitor rain gauges to fill in the gaps.

"When we can get accurate data on the amount of rain falling in our area, it helps us to better predict and better measure the water levels in our bayous. And that certainly helps us to be able to provide the Office of Emergency Management and other officials when we expect to have flooding from bayous coming out of their banks."

Saucier says volunteers also help them track the progress of rainfall in the entire 15-county region.

"Radar is a very good predictor of what we might get, but if we've got reports coming in from Ft. Bend County saying that people have received four and five inches of rain in the last two or three hours, that gives us very good and hard evidence as to what we will probably be receiving here in Harris County."

The volunteers are supposed to check the gauges daily and then record the data on the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network website, known as CoCoRaHS.